


Dead of Night

by citrinevalley



Category: HLVRAI - Fandom, Half Life VR But The AI Is Self Aware
Genre: M/M, Post-Canon, Processing Trauma, Stream of Consciousness, late night walks and sleepy smooches, mentions of boomer and G-Man, yall ever read too much into the emotions of a half life npc named after a dunkin donuts menu item?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-04
Updated: 2021-01-04
Packaged: 2021-03-14 01:35:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,790
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28538205
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/citrinevalley/pseuds/citrinevalley
Summary: When you've done everything but say "I love you", how do you say it? How do you build a future from the ashes of your past? Tommy tries to find the words and Gordon tries to pick up the pieces. Somewhere between waking and dreaming, they find a way.
Relationships: Tommy Coolatta/Gordon Freeman
Comments: 2
Kudos: 27





	Dead of Night

**Author's Note:**

> i haven't written fanfic in like five years but the spirit of freelatta manifested physically in my home and forced me to write this. this started out as a stream of conscious piece that i tried to clean up a little. enjoy!

Sleeping was something Tommy struggled with in the aftermath of the Resonance Cascade. Most nights, like tonight, he occupied his sleepless hours by cataloguing what had transpired at Black Mesa. All of their research had been destroyed, and Tommy took it upon himself to consolidate his observations. _After all_ , he thought wryly, _who else would write the Wikipedia article?_

His fingers hovered over the laptop keys. As much as this was a scientific account, it veered into confessional territory in places. Obviously nothing in regards to his father could be written, so his involvement was omitted. However, he would often get to the end of a long paragraph about the heroism of his colleague, Dr. Gordon Freeman, realize what he wrote, then stare embarrassed at the computer screen. As he was doing presently.

He highlighted the paragraph and deleted it with a decisive tap. The time on his monitor was 2:17AM.

Tommy had been restless ever since he and the science team emerged from the rubble of Black Mesa. His father had a way of erasing chaos just as easily as he caused it, and that combined with the breakneck cycle of the media and the government slapping up red tape faster than a bullet fleeing a .22, the past three months felt more like three years. The US military had tried to kill them, and now they were paying the science team to shut up and vanish into the milieu of ordinary life. Easier said than done.

This quiet ending was no doubt engineered by his father. While the others were free to move on, Tommy doubted his father would let him stray too far. Even so, with the rather large sum of hush money they’d all received, Tommy thought about leaving New Mexico. The desert had its own unique beauty, but it would be nice to have a place with a lush green yard for Sunkist to romp around in. New local flora and fauna to discover on their walks. A change of scenery could provide a new goal, a new purpose. Something new to chase instead of wading in bad memories.

Coomer and Bubby were retiring, the former had said on the phone. He wanted to show Bubby all the sights and sounds of the world beyond Black Mesa. The thought made Tommy smile. He pictured it like a set of postcards: Bubby and Coomer lounging in a tropical cabana, Bubby and Coomer climbing a mountain, Bubby and Coomer wearing cartoonish berets and sporting baguettes in the crooks of their arms. At least they seemed to be recuperating well. Tommy couldn’t speak for the other half of the science team, however.

Tommy thought, as he often did, about Gordon. Coomer could always be counted on to answer the phone with a cheery “Hello!” right after the first ring. Gordon seldom picked up the phone, and when he did he always sounded like he had just woken up. Tommy couldn’t blame him. Their de facto leader bore the brunt of the horrors they all had experienced. He had come to Black Mesa as an outsider, certainly the most normal man out of all of them. Coomer had his clones, Bubby spent his formative years inside a tube, and Tommy…

He looked at his reflection in the window. Dark gold eyes, thin pointed nose, thick (but admittedly receding) black hair. Laughlines had roosted in the corner of his eyes, and there was a new hollowness below his cheekbones. His father had been content to let him experience youth as a (somewhat) regular human, but Tommy was by no means a child anymore. Someday sooner than he’d like, his father would call upon him to… to what? 

Take his place? Not likely. The more likely answer was that he would instruct him to go someplace else, sometime else, to continue moving across the chessboard that only his father could see. Coomer, Bubby, and Gordon had served their purpose, earning a happy ending, drive into the sunset, fade to black. Tommy still had miles to go.

He rubbed his eyes, dry and tired from staring at a screen. He turned away from his desk and looked outside. Prickly pears and broad leaf yucca stood sentinel. All the houses on the street had their curtains drawn, windows dark. Except for Tommy, staring out the window and running over these thoughts like a river smooths a stone. Sunkist nudged his hand and Tommy reflexively reached to scratch behind the dog’s ears.

She whined. Tommy looked down and smiled. “Sorry I’m up so late. You can– you can go to bed if you want.” To punctuate the sentence, he snapped and pointed at the bed. She ignored the command, her soulful eyes brimming with concern.

Tommy turned back to his monitor, took a sip from an open soda can. Flat. Sunkist poked her snout against his side. Her tail thumped against the floor. They had a sort of telepathy between each other, Tommy able to read every tilt of her head or quirk of her ear. 

“Huh? It’s a little late for a walk.”

But she wasn’t budging. Tommy stood. “Well if you gotta go, you gotta go.”

The night air helped to clear his head, at least. Desert nights were bracing, dry and cold. Sunkist pulled him along their usual route. He let her lead him, tilting his head up. If Tommy did end up leaving New Mexico, he would have to still live somewhere where he could see the stars like this.

He had been sitting under these same stars the night he realized his feelings for Gordon. The science team sat together, bloodied and exhausted, while Gordon asked about their dreams. His attentive gaze and warm smile provided a much needed reminder to have hope in the face of death. Tommy had realized that more than a morale boost, Gordon gave Tommy a rare, wonderful hope he had not experienced before.

Countless times during their week of hell, Tommy wanted to tell him how he felt. _I know we’re both covered in blood and alien guts, but you’re the most beautiful man I’ve ever laid eyes on. Want to grab dinner if we don’t get shot in the head first? _Love confessions shouted over the screaming of missiles. Kissing in a hellish alien dimension. It would have been rash, ridiculous. If there was one thing Tommy knew, it was that there was never a right time for anything. Rather than being emboldened by that knowledge, it silenced him.__

____

____

Now it was months later and Tommy feared he had lost his chance. Gordon had retreated within himself, and Tommy felt like an idiot for not knowing how to get through to him. There had been those tired phone calls and a few outings to parks or restaurants. But Gordon, vibrant even in the worst of times, carried a haunted look in his eyes. Tommy could talk endlessly about nuclear regulations or quantum physics, but when it came to comforting someone he loved so much he was tongue tied. He still cringed when he thought about the time he asked Gordon if he wanted a soda right after his hand had been forcibly amputated.

Sunkist veered left on 17th instead of right. Why was she going the long way? Tommy let her trot along for another couple blocks. Dogs could be particular about where they relieved themselves. Yet she kept walking with purpose, not even interested in a passing sniff of the ground.

Tommy sighed. The hour was finally catching up to him. “Come on, it’s too late for–”

As they rounded another corner, he saw a figure standing down the block from them. Sunkist tugged on her leash. The silhouette had a solid build and a lumbering gait. When he stepped into the pool of light from the streetlamp, a familiar pair of glasses glinted back at Tommy.

“Mr. Freeman!”

He dropped the leash as he waved and Sunkist dashed over. She hopped up, paws pressed against Gordon’s chest, and started licking his face. Tommy felt a rush of warmth hearing Gordon’s laugh again. He followed after Sunkist.

“Hi, Tommy,” he said, giving Sunkist some well deserved pets. “I uh, didn’t expect you to be out so late.”

“I could say the same to you.” Didn’t he live on the complete opposite end of the neighborhood?

“Yeah, I’ve started going on walks,” Gordon said. “It helps me with all the...brain stuff. And with sleeping.” 

Gordon turned his head back down to Sunkist and Tommy finally noticed. “Oh! Mr. Freeman, you cut your hair!”

He rubbed the back of his head. The ponytail he usually sported was gone. “Yeah, I needed something low maintenance. Not enough Head and Shoulders in the world to scrub out all that blood, you know? Plus my head feels a lot lighter now.”

He rolled his neck as if to demonstrate. Tommy had privately adored his long locks, but the short, severe cut accentuated his features. His jawline seemed sharper, his cheekbones higher. “It looks han– hands– nice, Mr. Freeman.”

“Thanks. You look good too.”

Tommy had to laugh because he most certainly did not. Gordon’s tracksuit at least matched; Tommy’s oversized shirt/truck-patterned pajama pants/slides combo certainly did not. He picked up Sunkist’s leash to have something to do with his worrying hands.

 _Why was he so nervous?_ Tommy knew _why_ , but after what they went through together talking should be easy. They could blast their way through wave after wave of US military but stammered and fidgeted when it came to basic human interaction. 

This chance meeting at such a late hour made Tommy feel as if he were in a dream. He wanted to reach out and cup his cheek the way Gordon had done to him so many times before, just to reassure himself that he was real.

“Would you want to come over? I could– I could give you a ride back to your place. I wouldn’t want you walking by yourself this late.”

“Always looking out for me.” Gordon’s eyes crinkled when he smiled.

“That’s what I’m here for.”

That was ostensibly the reason for Gordon accompanying him and Sunkist back home, but the truth was neither had really seen each other face to face in a while. When they got back to Tommy’s, they lingered in the kitchen for a while talking about the August heat and whatever TV shows they had “been meaning to watch”, as if it wasn’t three in the morning and they weren’t trying to stave off their nightmares for as long as possible.

Gordon couldn’t help but feel guilty for not keeping in touch. Readjusting to normal life had been a struggle. A new job would give him a routine, but whenever he started reading the listings his eyes would glaze and the words became unrecognizable. He could be doing the simplest task, getting a glass of water or playing a video game and his brain would just check out. He would be dimly aware that he was sitting in his living room, but in his mind he was back in Xen.

Tommy offered him a soda, but Gordon declined. The late hour, the caffeine, etc. Tommy found a dented box of decaf tea in the pantry and made Gordon a cup of that instead. Gordon wasn’t fond of tea but holding the warm mug in his hands felt nice. They sat on the couch and Sunkist curled up on her bed in the corner, dozing off while they chatted.

Normal conversation could only carry them so far. Seeing Tommy’s relaxed, smiling face only reminded Gordon of when he ripped the sleeve off his own lab coat as a makeshift bandage for his severed hand. Scowling, determined, his face covered in blood. It was hard to believe that a man in an oversized Muppets shirt who had Digimon stickers on his 3DS could also shoot a headcrab between the eyes at 40 paces.

“Mr. Freeman?” Tommy asked. “You’re staring at me.”

He blinked. “Sorry, I was just thinking.”

“About Black Mesa?”

It was the first time either one of them had brought it up. What could Gordon say? That every time he closed his eyes he could feel the fleshy walls of Xen pulsating around him? That he saw the faces of the people he had killed in his bathroom mirror? But Gordon didn’t want to sour that gentle expression on Tommy’s face. He settled for long overdue gratitude.

“Yeah, I just…I just wanted to thank you. For everything you did back there. I would have died if you hadn’t been there for me.” Having his arm back didn’t erase the memories of losing it. It was a miracle he didn’t die of blood loss or sepsis. He grabbed his right wrist reflexively.

Tommy grimaced. “I could have...I should have done more.”

Gordon fought back an exasperated laugh. “Tommy, you carried my bleeding, half-dead ass through Black Mesa. You killed all those Coomer clones. You did more than enough.”

“I could have stopped them from taking your arm,” he said quietly. “I could have stood up to them.”

There was something haunted in his eyes, boring a hole into the floorboards with his stare. It was a look Gordon had caught in passing before, seeing behind the kindly face Tommy usually presented. Gordon gently shook his shoulder to break him of the reverie. 

“Hey. We got through it. It’s okay now.” Words Gordon himself wished he could believe.

Tommy met his gaze. The haunted look was gone, warmth returned to his golden eyes. He glanced at the hand on his shoulder. “Could I um...see your hand?”

“Uh, yeah, sure.” Gordon held out his right hand.

Gordon once remembered a girl at a bar who read his palm in lieu of a pickup line. The sensation was different with Tommy, more scientific. He gently moved the joints of his fingers, testing their flexibility. He pressed his thumb into the center of his palm, feeling the bones through the back of his hand with his other fingers. His hands were cool, dry, surprisingly soft.

He couldn’t remember the last time someone touched him so gently. He wanted to cry, he wanted to hug Tommy and not let go.

“How does it feel?” Tommy asked.

“Good.” It came out breathier than intended. He cleared his throat. “I mean, fine, normal. Good as new.”

Tommy pressed their hands together. Gordon swallowed when he saw how small his hand was compared to Tommy’s. Barely thinking about it, Gordon interlaced their fingers together. The flush that rose on Tommy’s neck didn’t escape him.

“Pretty neat trick,” Gordon said. “Your dad reattaching my hand, I mean.”

Tommy withdrew his hand. “He’s certainly full of tricks, yes.”

 _Backpedal, Freeman, backpedal._ “We don’t have to talk about him if you don’t want to. I just… don’t really understand.”

“I don’t either. There’s a lot I don’t know about him. But I’m glad he rea– re– put your arm back.”

“Me too.”

Maybe it was the lack of sleep or the late hour or how close together they were sitting, but a sudden bolt of confidence commanded him to lift up his hand again. He lightly traced his fingers down the side of Tommy’s jaw. 

“Gordon?”

“Yeah?”

“I’m glad you didn’t die.”

Gordon closed the space between them, gently pressing his lips against the other man’s. It was just for a second, chaste and curious. Gordon was already muttering an apology as he pulled away, but Tommy’s hands reached up to cup his face.

“It’s okay. You can– you can kiss me.” He licked his lips. “I want you to kiss me.”

He didn’t need to tell Gordon twice.

Gordon had been without someone else’s touch for so long that he could feel Tommy’s lips erasing all his worries. No more nightmares, no more pain, just Tommy’s warm breath against his mouth.

Tommy’s tongue ghosted against his bottom lip. Gordon parted his lips, allowing him entrance. The saccharine taste of soda still clung to his mouth. Gordon took a long, slow taste, and the sound Tommy made sent a bolt of heat to his core. He ran his fingers through Gordon’s newly shorn hair. It felt right.

Tommy pulled away this time. “Would you want to stay the night? I don’t mean like that,” he added quickly, color flooding his cheeks. “I just meant, it’s late, and- and I’m pretty tired.”

“Yeah, no, of course,” Gordon replied. 

“We can- Would you- Do you want to get breakfast in the morning?”

“Yeah, that sounds good.”

“Cool.”

“Cool.”

Their lips met again. Words failed them often, but luckily they weren’t always necessary.


End file.
